


Light and Dark

by Tierfal



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Drama, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-02
Updated: 2012-04-02
Packaged: 2017-11-02 22:57:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/374293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tierfal/pseuds/Tierfal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the prompt:<br/><i>Arthur finds out about Merlin's magic in some unavoidable life or death situation. Instead of being angry he is unbelievably turned on by BAMF!Merlin.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Light and Dark

Arthur stares.

He swallows.

He stares a little more.

“You…” he says. “You just…”

For a fraction of a moment, Merlin looks like the mutts that range around the marketplace just after an angry merchant has kicked them aside. Then he closes off, shadows cutting lines into his face as he turns away, and his eyes—blue again, still striking but so ordinary after… all of it—darken with rain-cloud speed.

Maybe that’s what makes Arthur look— _really_ look, and actually see.

Merlin is standing in the middle of a crater, the surface of which is blanketed in soot. A few trees are still halfheartedly burning. Bandit corpses lie everywhere like rag dolls cast away, and the sword that had been about to bury itself in Arthur’s midsection is a scattered ring of steel shards. Glancing at what remains of its owner makes Arthur’s rescued midsection mutinous even after some of the things he’s seen.

There is a light inside of Arthur’s chest. There is a part of him that always knows what he or anyone has to do. For obvious reasons, Arthur has never told anyone that he communicates with an inanimate luminescence stationed somewhere within his ribcage, but today it’s illuminating Merlin like a beacon in the night.

Merlin is not the cur in the marketplace. Merlin is not a bumbling servant who accidentally dyed Arthur’s nightshirt the same purple as Morgana’s dress; Merlin is not all elbows and eyelashes and long legs and blinding, beaming grin; Merlin is not exasperated and eye-rolling; Merlin is barely accessible at all.

Merlin is something legendary.

A rational part of Arthur remembers that he never heard Merlin utter a spell. The light in him prefers to feed him revelations that he couldn’t have alone—that Merlin’s magic is grounded and natural and inconceivable and true; there is a tremor of fear and a whisper of eternity.

“Damn,” Arthur says faintly. “Merlin. _Damn_.”

Merlin clambers out of the crater. There’s a cut on his cheek and a smear of ash on his forehead. He mutters, “Save it, Arthur,” and his voice is harsh.

There’s a dark edge to him that Arthur’s never seen before. The air still resonates with what was done, and the evidence surrounds them. No army in the world can wreak a hell quite like this. No human being Arthur’s ever met can build so much, give so much, accept so much, and take so much away.

The shiver starts in Arthur’s toes, rattling up his spine, rippling out through his fingers so that he reaches almost compulsively as Merlin, head down, shoulders set, makes to stride on by.

If Arthur had been thinking, he would have gone for the neckerchief, but Merlin’s sleeve will do. Arthur hauls him in with it—jerking him close, meeting his eyes, feeling another sweet frisson slide down his backbone at the thought of how those eyes looked when they were gold.

Merlin pulls against Arthur’s grip, and for the first time Arthur realizes just how much danger he could be in if he ever pushes Merlin too far.

Somehow, that’s what makes Arthur kiss him, curling a few fingers in the hair at the back of his neck, tasting ash and smoke and heaven only knows whose blood and a tingle of power that makes the light inside him searing.

Merlin draws back after a very long moment that makes Arthur wish long moments were longer. He looks accusing at first, but a little bewilderment seeps in, and then he gives over to the familiar ferocity of a kitten with its fur rubbed the wrong way.

Unfortunately, this time Arthur knows that the kitten is capable of clawing his eyes out and feeding them to him one at a time.

Merlin raises one slender finger and prods Arthur meaningfully in the chest.

“You,” he says, “are a prat. And a stupid one. And you were going to be a dead one. And you might still be if you don’t look out.”

“Shame on me,” Arthur says, and drags him in to kiss him again.

“Oh, good,” Merlin pants when they break apart. “I just realized that now I can use magic to shut you up.” Arthur raises an eyebrow. “Or,” Merlin says, glancing at him, “to make you kiss me again.”

Arthur pauses. “Waste of magic,” he decides.

“You usually are,” Merlin says, fisting both hands in his tabard to pull them close again.


End file.
